


Witching Hour

by TreacleTeacups



Series: Drabbles n Oneshots [10]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M, Master of Death Harry Potter, One Shot, Resurrection, SCRYING, gothic themed au, ominous fun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:14:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28909896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TreacleTeacups/pseuds/TreacleTeacups
Summary: Witching hour hits differently as the Master of Death
Relationships: Harry Potter/Tom Riddle | Voldemort
Series: Drabbles n Oneshots [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1859008
Comments: 6
Kudos: 180





	Witching Hour

**Author's Note:**

> Based on the prompt:  
> “Is 3 am in the morning, the witching hour and Harry is just trying to understand what does that mean for him; a wizard, is his magic more powerful? Can he talk to the death? What is so special about that time in the magic community?”  
> [(Image Source)](https://butteryplanet.tumblr.com/post/179540048113/cinemagraph-artist-kitchenghosts)

Harry lays under his blankets wide awake, the flannel fabric doing little to ward off the icy chill, and he groans. It’s 3am on a bitterly cold autumn morning, and Harry cannot sleep. It is not surprising, Harry has struggled with insomnia since his school years.

But he has a big meeting today. A career-changing meeting. He call ill afford to go in dead on his feet. He’s so damn tired, yet his mind is wired.

A while ago, Hermione posited that his insomina was due to the hour, three in the morning being a powerful time between the magical world and beyond, when the fabric of life was thinnest. It existed in different times, such as a full moon and Halloween. There were even physical manifestations of the barriers growing thin, such as fae rings and the man-made Veil.

Harry groaned again as he realised his mind was wandering. Harry sat up in bed, rubbing his sore eyes. Why, oh why did it have to be tonight?

Harry knows why, honestly. A full moon, Allhallow’s Eve just burst into full Halloween hours before, and it is fucking _three am._

Harry is tied to the magical fluctuations stronger than most. He was always sensitive, but his inheritance of the Master of Death, of the Deathly Hallows, has only emphasised what was already there.

Harry feels restless. His skin is crawling. He needs to do something, though what he’s not sure.

A wolf howls in the distance. Harry flicks his cottage studio’s curtain aside and watches a murder of crows pass over the glowing full moon, hanging ripe in the air as if Harry could simply reach out and pluck it from the sky.

Harry grimaced. He’d decided to go to his farm property, rather than stay in his city flat and risk being kept awake by party goers. There were always silencing spells, but they did little when one lived over a rowdy pub and the vibrations of a proper celebration rocked the very core of the building structure. But now Harry was regretting that decision, the repeated wolf howls raising the hair on his arms and the shallow light of the full moon casting a haunting, two dimensional light across his normally charming cottage. A gothic chill crawled up Harry’s spine, a tingle of warning playing at the back of his mind.

Harry scoffed, tossing the thought aside. Halloween had always been a rough time for Harry. He hardly needed to add to the stress by being morose and ghoulish. He’s an adult, for Merlin’s sake, he’s hardly a fretful child.

Harry pushed his curtains aside and didn’t bother lighting a candle; the full moon cast light to see well enough. He wandered over to his desk, his scrying pool rippling in its small dish. Harry pauses and glances back at the scrying dish. It shows enemies, large things coming, and general warnings. Harry gives little credence to prophecies, but his scry has never led him wrong.

Harry leans over the dish, eyebrows drawing together. His reflection stares back at him, dark bruises under green eyes and a wild mop of hair. Something flickers beyond the surface.

Harry sits down at his desk, pulls the scry near. He has a brief thought of concern - it’s too powerful an hour, too powerful a night - but brushes it aside.

If Harry concentrates on his magic, on the strange void that the hollows live in his core; the death magic brings clearer and sharper visions.

Harry gently closes his eyes, focuses his magic through the prism of his Hallows magic, and reopens his eyes to stare down sharply at the scry.

Harry cries out as a hand shoots out of the small dish, gripping Harry’s wrist and dark nails digging into the tender flesh. Harry rears back and somehow, impossibly, a creature the size of a man is pulled through the small dish.

Harry tumbles back onto the floor and the creature comes with him, hand still gripped onto his wrist, brutually pushing the breath from his lungs and leaving him winded as two bodies hit the ground. Stars blink in his eyes as Harry reels from hitting the wood floor, mouth gaping as his lungs attempt to draw in breath, a heavy weight on his stomach.

‘Interesting,’ a deep, smooth voice comments.

Harry’s swimming vision clears and he freezes, mind blanking pitifully.

Laying on top of Harry, from foot to chest, is Tom Riddle, Jr.

'It’s not possible,’ Harry rasps, astonished.

'And yet here I am,’ the visage of Tom Riddle replies, a wolfish grin spreading across his face.

Harry realises his wrists are pinned- _pinned!_ \- to the wood floor. He struggles, but his tumble and encompassing shock has made him weak.

'You’re dead,’ Harry protests dumbly, bucking to no avail. 'You’re dead!’

'Ah, one would need the Master of Death to revert something like that, now wouldn’t we?’ Tom replies slyly, looking for all the world like a wolf in sheep’s clothing - handsome, smug, _lethal_. 'I think someone missed me.’

'Go to hell!’ Harry gasps, trying to curl his fingers so he can claw at the hands pinning him down.

Tom grins, lowers his head to press his forehead against Harry’s scarred own. 'I’ve already been, sweetheart. And now that I’m back, I’m never, _ever_ leaving you again.’

* * *

Harry awakens with a jolt, breath crackling out of his lips as he heaves. He’s drenched in sweat, shivering. Harry glances at his clock and swears - his meeting is in half an hour! Harry leaps out of bed, brushes his teeth while brewing a cup of tea, and struggles into his clothes.

Harry suddenly stops. Remembers.

Harry turns to his desk. His scrying bowl is full, where he left it yesterday eve. His chair is upright. The room is untouched.

Harry shakes his head, a morbid laugh bursting through his lips. What a dream. Merlin, he hates Halloween.

Harry casts a flaming spell on his fireplace and throws floo powder into the grate. As he calls out his destination and steps into the flash of green flames, spinning, he starts as he notices there are sooty bruises in the shape of fingermarks on his wrists.


End file.
